An English-language book about this language’s literature includes an appendix exercise that examines translations of a sentence about white wicker chairs. In a book subtitled for this language, the author recalls the “emptiness” of a Cape Cod writing colony while reading the anthology Best American Short Stories. After switching from this language to English, an author quipped, “I am too old to change Conradically.” A book titled for a novel in this language ends by analyzing it through René Girard’s theory of mimetic desire and was inspired by its author’s Stanford graduate studies. Stories in this language are the subject of George Saunders’s 2021 book A Swim in a Pond in the Rain. A book titled for a novel in this language follows Selim’s studies at Harvard and is by Elif Batuman. For 10 points, Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky translate novels from what language used to write The Idiot? ■END■
ANSWER: Russian [or russkij; accept The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People Who Read Them]
<American Literature>
= Average correct buzz position